interstellaris
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- 28.09.2023
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Ich hoffe, ich darf auf Englisch posten. Mein Englisch ist zwar schlecht, aber ich hatte das Ganze auf Englisch angefangen und jetzt wäre es doch ein bissi umständlich, das alles nochmal auf Deutsch zu schreiben.
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I am sharing my personal experience here. I travel a lot, take a lot of photos and I am old. Therefore over the last decade I have accumulated like 100.000 / 320 GB of photos. First on the iPhone itself only, later on the 200 GB free iCloud plan and after that on the 10 Euros a month 2 TB iCloud plan.
I was constantly feeling unwell, as there actually is no easy way to get hold of your own photos in terms of physically owning them on your own physical drive and consequently being able to back them up at a device with similar qualities. It really bothered me that I cannot simply grab my photos and run away or being able to backup them properly.
My aim is moreover to reduce the number of photos at iCloud significantly so that I can go back to the 200 GB free space.
BTW this is NOT about incremental backups! After having regained control over my huge amount of photos I deleted all of my photos from iCloud and now have a fresh start with far less data to handle, download, backup and delete constantly.
It took me weeks to figure out how to do it on a trial and error base and I can honestly say that I am absolutely positive that I will never again put myself in such a situation where it seems impossible to get back what is yours and although it was possible it was such a hassle which I plan not to repeat.
Here is what I have tried and done:
Use Windows´ iCloud Photos:
Does not work as it cannot handle such an amount of data.
Use iCloud photos in browser and export from there:
Might work but will probably let you end up as a nutter. You can only download batches of 1.000 max. I have not tried and therefore I am not aware about the outcome.
Buy and use the Copytrans software:
Has not worked for me. Did 5 goes with 5 different outcomes each varying by thousands of photos. Not reliable imo.
Use Google photos:
Have not tried this, it seems quite ridiculous to upload 320 GB from iCloud to Google cloud in order to download them from there.
Request your photos at https://privacy.apple.com/ :
It works:
Use external software from github:
https://github.com/icloud-photos-downloader/icloud_photos_downloader:
I have not tried this one.
Get an iMac:
It seems to odd that you have to go to such great lengths, but I have not found any other solution that works reliably: Get an old iMac which can be updated to at least MacOS Monterey. The internal drive should have enough space to save your photos plus some more.
From here you have some options (sorry, my user interface is not in English, so I can only guess)
PHOTOSLIBRARY ON MAC
Enable photos in iCloud on your Mac. Go to iPhoto settings and chose something along the lines of “sync original size” and “turn off optimization”. Wait a couple of days (depending not so much on the speed of your internet connection but most of all Apple´s servers) until it has been synced at your Mac.
You now have a file on your Mac at your personal folder with the ending xxx.photoslibrary.
This contains your photo library - but keep in mind that this is a database only. If you copy this file to Windows, it´s useless and on tops gets probably damaged, it contains folders when opening but they are a mess at Windows, as it is a Mac based database only. Plus, remember that everything in your Photoslibrary app is only synced. Whatever you delete here will be deleted in iCloud and vice versa.
For peace of mind I renamed, kept it at my Mac as a fourth redundant backup and created a new library I designated as the system library for my fresh start.
When you want to have a backup of that MAC library on an external drive, make sure to chose APFS format for your external drive as this is the only format that handles the photoslibrary which moreover can only be opened on your Mac.
EXPORTING FROM PHOTOS APP ON MAC
You can use your synced iPhotos app on your mac to export your photos with some settings – as jpegs or as originals (which is .heic for some years now). Select all and then chose export. In the “originals” case you will have one folder with all your photos - jpegs for the old photos and heics for the photos from recent years. Unfortunately the outcome is nevertheless a complete useless mess. You do not get useful file names in a reasonable order by creation date / date when photo was taken or other. I could not find a pattern behind all this. Several photos have one file number what means that you for example have 17 photos with the name IMG_0897 looking like that: IMG_0897, IMG_0897 (1), IMG_0897 (2), IMG_0897 (3) and so on. Those photos have not context which eachother whatsoever and stem from various dates spread over one decade.
At least they contain geo data and the dates the photo was taken. One could think that you might be able to sort them by the dates the photos were taken but due to the sheer mass of photos in one folder this is not possible on Windows.
The further procedure here would be to backup this folder containing all the messy files from Mac to an external drive that also can be used on Windows (format as exfat) and then backup to other drives.
In this case you have a mess, but at least you have your photos back.
Series photos will be lost in this case.
USE PHOTOS EXPORT PRO APP FOR MAC
This app is available for Mac only and costs 4 Euros.
Until I found it I had almost given up, and I definitely would recommend this one, although it is not perfect.
Here you also have the following options: “originals” or “jpegs”. Go for “originals”, as otherwise your exif / geo data gets lost.
Then you have “current version” and the “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)” options. Go for “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)”.
You also see and have your own albums plus Apple´s folders such as videos, portraits, panoramas, live photos etc. which is extremely helpful. Geodata and dates when photos were taken will be kept.
As for portraits, you have to run an extra export with the portraits folder only and chose the settings “originals” and “current version”. They are containing Bokeh-effects that will be lost when choosing “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)”.
Unfortunately there are two things with that app that do not work properly:
With the Photos Export Pro App you can also designate your external drive (format with exfat) as your destination folder for the outcome and then use that external drive with windows for cloning / other local backups or whatever.
However, please always keep in mind that iCloud is not a backup but a syncing tool.
Good luck!
----------------------------------------------------
I am sharing my personal experience here. I travel a lot, take a lot of photos and I am old. Therefore over the last decade I have accumulated like 100.000 / 320 GB of photos. First on the iPhone itself only, later on the 200 GB free iCloud plan and after that on the 10 Euros a month 2 TB iCloud plan.
I was constantly feeling unwell, as there actually is no easy way to get hold of your own photos in terms of physically owning them on your own physical drive and consequently being able to back them up at a device with similar qualities. It really bothered me that I cannot simply grab my photos and run away or being able to backup them properly.
My aim is moreover to reduce the number of photos at iCloud significantly so that I can go back to the 200 GB free space.
BTW this is NOT about incremental backups! After having regained control over my huge amount of photos I deleted all of my photos from iCloud and now have a fresh start with far less data to handle, download, backup and delete constantly.
It took me weeks to figure out how to do it on a trial and error base and I can honestly say that I am absolutely positive that I will never again put myself in such a situation where it seems impossible to get back what is yours and although it was possible it was such a hassle which I plan not to repeat.
Here is what I have tried and done:
Use Windows´ iCloud Photos:
Does not work as it cannot handle such an amount of data.
Use iCloud photos in browser and export from there:
Might work but will probably let you end up as a nutter. You can only download batches of 1.000 max. I have not tried and therefore I am not aware about the outcome.
Buy and use the Copytrans software:
Has not worked for me. Did 5 goes with 5 different outcomes each varying by thousands of photos. Not reliable imo.
Use Google photos:
Have not tried this, it seems quite ridiculous to upload 320 GB from iCloud to Google cloud in order to download them from there.
Request your photos at https://privacy.apple.com/ :
It works:
- It is not available in every country
- You have to wait a couple of days until your data is ready for download
- They come in batches of 25 GB each
- It takes days to download, Apple servers are so slow that it hurts. Moreover had several terminations of connections
- The outcome is a complete mess. Dates the photo was taken were there but they come with weird file numbers. You have a bulk of 100.000 photos with no context, no order, just a complete mess.
- No series, no portraits, no live photos.
Use external software from github:
https://github.com/icloud-photos-downloader/icloud_photos_downloader:
I have not tried this one.
Get an iMac:
It seems to odd that you have to go to such great lengths, but I have not found any other solution that works reliably: Get an old iMac which can be updated to at least MacOS Monterey. The internal drive should have enough space to save your photos plus some more.
From here you have some options (sorry, my user interface is not in English, so I can only guess)
PHOTOSLIBRARY ON MAC
Enable photos in iCloud on your Mac. Go to iPhoto settings and chose something along the lines of “sync original size” and “turn off optimization”. Wait a couple of days (depending not so much on the speed of your internet connection but most of all Apple´s servers) until it has been synced at your Mac.
You now have a file on your Mac at your personal folder with the ending xxx.photoslibrary.
This contains your photo library - but keep in mind that this is a database only. If you copy this file to Windows, it´s useless and on tops gets probably damaged, it contains folders when opening but they are a mess at Windows, as it is a Mac based database only. Plus, remember that everything in your Photoslibrary app is only synced. Whatever you delete here will be deleted in iCloud and vice versa.
For peace of mind I renamed, kept it at my Mac as a fourth redundant backup and created a new library I designated as the system library for my fresh start.
When you want to have a backup of that MAC library on an external drive, make sure to chose APFS format for your external drive as this is the only format that handles the photoslibrary which moreover can only be opened on your Mac.
EXPORTING FROM PHOTOS APP ON MAC
You can use your synced iPhotos app on your mac to export your photos with some settings – as jpegs or as originals (which is .heic for some years now). Select all and then chose export. In the “originals” case you will have one folder with all your photos - jpegs for the old photos and heics for the photos from recent years. Unfortunately the outcome is nevertheless a complete useless mess. You do not get useful file names in a reasonable order by creation date / date when photo was taken or other. I could not find a pattern behind all this. Several photos have one file number what means that you for example have 17 photos with the name IMG_0897 looking like that: IMG_0897, IMG_0897 (1), IMG_0897 (2), IMG_0897 (3) and so on. Those photos have not context which eachother whatsoever and stem from various dates spread over one decade.
At least they contain geo data and the dates the photo was taken. One could think that you might be able to sort them by the dates the photos were taken but due to the sheer mass of photos in one folder this is not possible on Windows.
The further procedure here would be to backup this folder containing all the messy files from Mac to an external drive that also can be used on Windows (format as exfat) and then backup to other drives.
In this case you have a mess, but at least you have your photos back.
Series photos will be lost in this case.
USE PHOTOS EXPORT PRO APP FOR MAC
This app is available for Mac only and costs 4 Euros.
Until I found it I had almost given up, and I definitely would recommend this one, although it is not perfect.
Here you also have the following options: “originals” or “jpegs”. Go for “originals”, as otherwise your exif / geo data gets lost.
Then you have “current version” and the “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)” options. Go for “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)”.
You also see and have your own albums plus Apple´s folders such as videos, portraits, panoramas, live photos etc. which is extremely helpful. Geodata and dates when photos were taken will be kept.
As for portraits, you have to run an extra export with the portraits folder only and chose the settings “originals” and “current version”. They are containing Bokeh-effects that will be lost when choosing “unprocessed (if applicable RAW)”.
Unfortunately there are two things with that app that do not work properly:
- Apart from one freeze frame pic, series disappear, they should be divided into singles before using this app.
- Live Photos are really tricky. I do not know why but in my case only half of my about 1.000 live photos have been exported correctly including the corresponding movie, as with the other half only the freeze frame picture survived. Here you have to go the messy way and export live photos separately and manually via the export function with the photos app on Mac.
With the Photos Export Pro App you can also designate your external drive (format with exfat) as your destination folder for the outcome and then use that external drive with windows for cloning / other local backups or whatever.
However, please always keep in mind that iCloud is not a backup but a syncing tool.
Good luck!
